


Practice Exam

by eloquated



Series: Stranger Than Fiction [1]
Category: Doctor Strange (2016), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Sherlock (TV)
Genre: F/M, Mostly Fluff, Pre-Canon, University, with a tiiiiny bit of feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-05
Updated: 2019-04-05
Packaged: 2020-01-05 06:22:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,052
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18360404
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eloquated/pseuds/eloquated
Summary: On a hot afternoon, Molly and Stephen find it hard to focus on their studying.Luckily, they still have a few hours.





	Practice Exam

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! 
> 
> So I finally got around to watching Doctor Strange, and ended up spending a bunch of the movie just thinking, "Wow, he and Molly would be amazing..." 
> 
> It's my first stab at writing it, but I'm crossing my fingers and hoping you enjoy! 💕

“ 67 year-old male who was recently diagnosed with lung cancer presents with fever and shortness of breath that started 2 days prior to presentation…”  Molly stretched out comfortably on the side of Stephen’s bed, one hand propping up her head, and the other flipping through the practice exam unfolded across his legs.

It was the hottest afternoon imaginable, the early spring sunshine gleaming through the slightly (for that was all it could open) cracked window, and threatening to melt the two students inside.  

On the bedside table, Stephen’s alarm clock reminded them that their time was running out; thirteen hours and counting, before they’d sit their end of year exam.  Thirteen hours, and Molly was mostly sure that neither of them was going to get a wink of sleep.

“Which of the following organism is most likely responsible for patient’s disease?”  

Stephen shifted slightly, trying to make the best of the narrow dorm bed.  It wasn’t the most comfortable thing, but they’d managed to make it work for most of the semester, (a minor miracle in itself, that neither of them had woken up on the floor.  Too often). With a slight furrow between his brows, he tried to visualize the question, his mind working through the mental checklist of diagnosis.

“Are there any other symptoms?  Chest pains?” He asked, fixing the pillow behind his head.  Propped up a little more, Stephen could see the way Molly was draped against his side, her head at the footboard so he couldn’t spy on the exam answers.  

“You check out his heard, and hear a holosystolic murmur that you’re sure wasn’t there before.”  Idly, Molly trailed her fingers over the long line of his calf, feeling the thin layer of sweat and the crinkle of dark hair.  They’d intended to study all day-- but they’d managed to get just a little sidetracked somewhere between Microbiology, and Pharmacology.

Clothes scattered around the side of the bed, they’d decided it was simply too hot to bother with redressing; and, draped in the disheveled sheets, there was nobody else around to see them.

Oh, the beauty of a door with a lock!

_ And really _ , Molly thought to herself with a faint giggle,  _ It was still anatomy.  And stress relief! So it’s still studying… Not that there’s anything sexy about protozoa! _

Thirteen hours until their written, and thirty before their practical.  Nothing nerve wracking, or stomach ache inducing about that!

“Molly, back to Earth.”  

Stephen’s voice cut tidily through her distraction, his deft hands curling around the meat of her thigh with a squeeze.  Two years on, he knew he was still not very good with comforting; the words felt cheap and useless in his mouth, senseless platitudes that he tried not to use.

But he wanted to help. 

He hated the way she’d toss and turn in her sleep when she was anxious (and not just because it always resulted in being pummeled with her feet, or getting an elbow to the chest!), and how obviously she was trying to hide it from him.

_ You have the same worries, I don’t want to make it any harder for you,  _ she’d told him once.  And he’d thought it was equal parts endearing, and pointlessly ridiculous.  

So he reached out, closing the inches of space between them, his fingers mapping along her thigh.  Mentally, he named the long muscles as he kneaded over them;  _ sartorius, gracilis, adductor longus…  _ Lean and smooth under his palm, and his theoretical patient all but forgotten.

“Stephen!  We’re supposed to be-- don’t give me that Cheshire Cat look!”  

Oh but he was beautiful when he was being smug!

With a giggling mock-protest, Molly shimmied up against the foot of the bed, dragging the sheet with her.  “We have to finish this part of the practice exam! Your patient, remember? 67-year-old male with cancer?”

Stephen caught the edge of the sheet before it slither off his lap entirely-- though it was more of token modesty, since the thin, white cotton left very little to the imagination.  “I’d rather examine the 23-year-old, non-cancerous, and highly stressed female. Particularly the one blushing at the end of my bed.”

“We’re never going to get anything done at this rate!”

“We will.”  Stephen countered, all long limbs and unfair confidence as he twisted around on the narrow bed, and brushed a kiss to the inside of her raised knee, “We have thirteen hours, and you function best on six hours of sleep.  That leaves us seven hours to finish the last... “ He glanced at the rumpled exam she’d hugged to her breast, and traced the seam of flesh and paper with the tip of his finger.

Two years, and it was still gratifying to make her shiver.  Two years, and it was still hard to keep his hands off her. 

“Three sections of the exam.  We have more than enough time.”

He wasn’t wrong, as usual (damn him).

“I suppose.. It’s almost time for dinner, and a short--  _ short,  _ Stephen!-- break…”  

Two years, and her student Visa would expire soon, and he hadn’t decided if he would be doing his residency in America, or going back to England with Molly.

It was already twice as much time as they should have had; but they’d met, and loving Molly was the easiest thing in the world.  So she’d petitioned for an extra year. And they’d been lucky.

Two years, and she hadn’t pushed him for a commitment he couldn’t make.  

Instead, Stephen kissed the inside of her knee again, his breath just a shade warmer than the air, as he mapped out the inside of her thigh with his lips.  

He reveled in the lazy comb of her fingers through his hair, and smirked against her skin when he heard the test rustle and slide to the floor.

“You think you’re so irresistible!”

“I have evidence to support that.  Recent evidence, in fact”

“You’re such a prat!”

“And you love me?”  Stephen looked up with a smirk, taking in her flushed cheeks and the laughing curve of her mouth.  

They had decisions they couldn’t put off much longer; but for that moment, he had Molly in his arms, and a hypothetical patient that needed his attention.

“Of course I do.  I always will.”

And time.  

For now, they had time.


End file.
